Presented by: Anisa Zvonkovic, Ph.D., Peggy Meszaros, Ph.D., April Few-Demo, Ph.D., Katherine Allen, Ph.D.
Andrea Swenson, Emma Potter, Monica Kimbrell, Katherine Hickey, Katie Barrow

Four senior family scholars and five doctoral students are embarking on a long-range project to articulate key elements of a family studies (FS) perspective. Our ultimate goal is to position family studies inarguably as central to the increasingly interdisciplinary and translational research and practice environment solving global human problems. Rather than more publications that only reach FS audiences, we posit that communication to articulate the field of FS needs to be brief, to capitalize on technology, and be well documented (allowing for periodic updating). Our long-range product will be an online tutorial that provides an interactive way to learn and appreciate the hallmarks of a FS perspective. For now, we are engaged in a replicable method to determine key elements of a FS perspective. We have drawn a random sample of articles in 4 key FS journals and have identified via content analysis key elements of the perspectives in these articles. We have drawn another random sample of articles from 4 journals that are not in the field of FS but do present FS content. We have identified key elements of the perspectives in those articles. We will juxtapose the perspectives from the different journals. We will also discuss with the audience what additional authoritative texts such as books should be examined for how they present the elements of a FS perspective. Audience members will participate in interactive activities that will be additional data for us to describe FS perspectives.